Shattered
by Alekto
Summary: Now complete! Injured while out scouting on the plateau,Roxton slips into a living nightmare where he can no longer tell friend from foe.
1. Roxton

Shattered  
  
By  
  
Alekto  
  
  
  
Summary: Injured while out scouting on the Plateau, Roxton slips into a living nightmare where he can no longer tell friend from foe.  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters from the Lost World - I'm just borrowing them for a little while.  
  
Timeline: This is set early in the 3rd Season, pre- True Spirit - Malone is still missing following the events of Fire in the Sky/ Into the Blue. The group consists of Challenger, Roxton, Marguerite and Veronica.  
  
Acknowledgements: Thanks as always to my wonderful betas - Julia and Mary - for their support, ideas and the trouble they go to, checking that what I've written actually makes sense.  
  
Author's note: This story is written from the 1st person POVs of Roxton, Marguerite, Challenger and Veronica. ... indicates a flashback. This story assumes the pre series background that is referred to in "Ulysses", but should make sense if you have not read that fic.  
  
Rating: PG  
  
  
  
********  
  
  
  
Time present and time past  
  
Are both perhaps present in time future,  
  
And time future contained in time past.  
  
If all time is eternally present  
  
All time is unredeemable.  
  
What might have been is an abstraction  
  
Remaining a perpetual possibility  
  
Only in a world of speculation.  
  
What might have been and what has been  
  
Points to one end, which is always present.  
  
Footfalls echo in the memory  
  
Down the passage which we did not take  
  
Towards the door we never opened.  
  
  
  
T.S.Eliot  
  
Four Quartets, 'Burnt Norton', pt 1.  
  
  
  
  
  
********  
  
  
  
Chapter 1  
  
-Roxton-  
  
One of these days I knew I'd be able to spend time in the jungle without being attacked by raptors, trapped by giant carnivorous plants, pursued by a T-rex or encountering some lost human (or in the lizards' case - not so human) culture intent on being unpleasant to me.  
  
But not today.  
  
We'd left the tree house a few days earlier, still searching for Malone. The rest of us had managed to get off the airship, so it made sense that perhaps, somehow, he had as well. To be frank, I'd begun to lose hope, but Veronica was adamant that Malone was still out there, somewhere. I had too much respect for a girl who had become like a younger sister to me to ask her to stop searching before she was willing to admit to herself that we may never find him.  
  
While the others had set up camp for the evening, I'd set out to find something for the pot. Our search for Malone had brought us to a part of the plateau that I didn't know as well as the area around the tree house. Even Veronica admitted that she hadn't been to the area in many years.  
  
I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised then that the local tribe, which Veronica had described as shy of outsiders, should have since her visit metamorphosed from shyness to xenophobia.  
  
Had I mentioned that they also seemed to have taken to cannibalism?  
  
I'd gone out to find something to have for dinner. That irony was not lost on me as I fled through the jungle pursued by at least twenty of their hunters. The couple of shots I'd fired didn't discourage them as I'd hoped, and there were too many to even think of turning to take a stand. Even the four of us together wouldn't have lasted long: the denseness of the jungle reduced the advantage of our guns as we would only have been able to get a shot at them during the few seconds after they broke cover.  
  
My only recourse then was to lead them away from Marguerite and the others, and hope that I could lose them. Being honest with myself, I wasn't optimistic of my chances.  
  
I carried on running, taking a route away from where the others were camping. It was still close enough that they might have heard the gunshots, but as I'd gone out hunting, it wouldn't seem unusual. I didn't want them coming into this thick jungle after me. I'd got myself into this mess and I was going to have to get myself out of it. Or not.  
  
The jungle was hot, stiflingly close. It seemed like I'd been running forever. My legs ached along with my chest as I struggled for breath after precious breath. I couldn't tell how close behind my pursuers were: they moved like silent wraiths through the same undergrowth that tore and dragged at me. An arrow thudded into a tree, scant inches from my head. My own automatic reaction jerked me backwards, the ground underneath my feet gave way and I fell. I reached out to try to halt my fall, but found only a handful of foliage, which came away in my hand. Something struck my thigh, my head, my chest, and then I saw nothing but blackness.  
  
****  
  
Nagging pain urged me back to consciousness. The memory of being prey in a hunt surfaced soon after and hard-learned survival instincts took over as I lay still and silent, trying to mute the breathing that rasped deafeningly in my ears. I could hear a commotion above me, voices chattering in a language I couldn't understand.  
  
Had they seen me? There was no way to tell. Scarcely daring to open my eyes, I tried to take stock of my situation. My own weight was forcing a steady pressure on my chest as if I was sprawled face down across a beam. I could feel the sweat running down my neck and back, sticking clothes to skin. I'd fallen - that much I could remember. I'd been running to escape from... Indians? My head pounded mercilessly. I had memories of a nightmarish flight through the jungle, voices calling after me in anger, but it was all confused, blurred, disjointed. I decided to concentrate on more immediate matters.  
  
The voices faded after some minutes. I waited a while longer and decided to risk moving. A flare of pain came from my left leg as I did. So, it wasn't only my head that was injured. I looked around to get a clearer picture of where I was.  
  
It became clear that I'd fallen about thirty or forty feet down a steep sided ravine that turned into a sheer drop about twenty feet below where I had ended up, and I owed my life to the tree that had stopped my fall. It had grown clinging onto the steep slope along with some other hardy bushes which largely blocked the view from the lip of the ravine. I'd ended up jammed in the 'V' that had been formed between the trunk and the slope.  
  
Five minutes of careful manoeuvring and I was sitting more comfortably straddling the tree trunk. My head was bleeding, though not too badly, but I could feel a lump the size of a grapefruit coming up behind my right ear. The sweat which I thought I'd felt running down my leg turned out to be blood coming from a long, ragged edged but shallow gash in my thigh, crusted with dirt and grit. It was only seeping blood now but I wanted to get it cleaned out. The problem I had was how to get out of the ravine, and quickly. I could see the sun dipping towards the horizon and my getting caught in so precarious a position all night was not something I wanted to consider.  
  
Under normal circumstances I would have had no qualms about attempting the rough scramble to the top, but I wasn't at all sure how much weight my leg would bear. If it decided to give out at the wrong time, the result was self-evident, and while I hoped there might be water to break my fall at the bottom of the ravine, it was not an assumption I planned to put to the test.  
  
I leaned there for some time in the fading light, trying to ignore the persistent throb of pain from my leg and head. Like a mountaineer mapping out the strategy for a climb, I studied the slope: thirty or forty feet, and I couldn't afford even one mishap. The urgency brought on by the rapidly failing daylight warred with my own sense of caution as I mentally tagged the locations of trees, branches and protruding rocks that might bear my weight. The mere process of hauling myself to my feet sent a wave of dizziness through my head. I made the mistake of looking down and was assailed by a sudden, alien rush of vertigo.  
  
A chiding inner voice that I'd never been able to silence berated me for my weakness and lent me the required burst of determination. Every ounce of strength I had left became concentrated on the task of climbing out of the ravine. My focus narrowed to the location of the next foothold or hand hold. I could feel sweat - or was it blood - running down the side of my face, but I couldn't spare a hand to wipe it away.  
  
Reaching the lip of the ravine came almost as a surprise. My pain and exhaustion fogged mind took a few moments to acknowledge that I'd made it and was still alive. Then the jungle seemed to recede down a long dark tunnel and I collapsed in the undergrowth, utterly spent.  
  
****  
  
I'm not sure how long I lay there, drifting in the half aware state between waking and sleeping. I had the vaguest recollection that night had fallen, so I guessed it must have been some time. Around me the noises of the jungle had settled back into their usual rhythm, as if forgetting the human presence so close by. I clambered to my feet as quietly as I could and stood there, listening. Even that slight movement had disturbed the birds who shrieked their warning cries through the jungle. I knew there would be a good chance that the people who had been hunting me would return at daybreak to check if I had survived, so I had to move.  
  
At the back of my mind there was a sudden conviction that my pursuers would not have given up until they knew I was dead. I didn't know where the idea came from or why I should have been so certain of their intentions - all I knew was that it was something I was utterly convinced about, without knowing exactly why.  
  
I started to walk, wanting to get back to.where? For an instant I had the oddest impression that there was somewhere I needed to be, someone who would be worried about where I was, then the feeling was gone. My head was pounding in time with my heartbeat. Around me I saw the jungle shimmer like a mirage, then steady again. Through the canopy I could make out the full moon overhead that was already riding high in the sky, shedding enough light to paint the jungle floor in eerie tones of grey and black.  
  
For a few minutes I looked around for my rifle, but it was gone. I regretted the loss of the rifle - the .470 had served me well over the years. All I had left was the Colt in its flap-top holster and my knife. As I was looking over the handgun to check it was undamaged, my eyes strayed to the rifle cartridges tucked into the loops on my belt. They looked...wrong...somehow. I pulled one out. It was roughly the right size, but it was not flanged as were the cartridges for my double ejector .470. The cartridges in my belt were for a bolt-action rifle of the sort I hadn't carried since I gave the .318 to my friend Domingo a couple of months earlier. I tried to think why I was carrying them, but could find no answer.  
  
In the first light of day I bathed the gash on my leg in a small stream I'd found. Ideally, the wound needed stitching, but all I could do was rinse out my already blood soaked handkerchief and use it as a crude bandage. It was, I knew, a far from ideal solution. Breakfast was a makeshift affair put together from a couple of familiar looking fruits. That done, I headed off, favouring my leg as little as I could.  
  
I'd been walking for a couple of hours when I heard voices, far off but approaching. There was plenty of cover to choose from so I hid in the hollow left by an uprooted tree. I couldn't make out the quieter snatches of conversation, but the repeated call was very clear. A woman's voice, cutting through the intervening jungle, "Roxton! Where are you?"  
  
****  
  
"Roxton, where are you? You can't hide forever, you know." The voice was arrogant, mocking, but it still bore the seductive purr that had set my nerves on edge from our first meeting in the hacienda that she and her brother had killed an old friend of mine to acquire. Since then I'd taken it upon myself to cause her some considerable difficulties in her less than legitimate business enterprises. Dona Maria Lopez's subsequent pursuit of her grudge against me had cost the lives of some good friends of mine.  
  
She was right in her assessment, though, I knew that much. My flight was going to end sooner or later, and end in only one way. Damn the bitch! I knew just as surely that the last thing I ever wanted to do was to show myself. She'd clearly paid Indians from one of the local tribes to track me, and they were far too good for comfort. Fit and rested I'd have been hard pressed to elude them. Tired and hurt after the tender ministrations of her thugs, I stood no chance.  
  
Damn the woman! I decided that if I was going out, I was sure as hell not going alone. From my hiding place I watched as she and her hunters neared. I only had three bullets left, normally more than sufficient, but the beating I'd taken had left me dizzy and nauseous. I accepted that I might need all three bullets just to be sure of one of them hitting the target.  
  
She stalked through the jungle ahead of her guards, undeniably elegant in her tailored white blouse and khaki skirt. A rifle was held lightly in her hands with a casualness that warned of proficiency. Her long black hair cascaded free and lustrous down her back. She might have been responsible for the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of people from the Indian tribes of the region, but on some level she was still...desirable.  
  
I pulled the gun and carefully aimed.  
  
She stepped closer.  
  
I fired.   
  
****  
  
I pulled the Colt and carefully aimed.  
  
She stepped closer. "Roxton, where are you?" she called.  
  
I fired.  
  
She spun and fell.  
  
The older, sandy haired man with her looked at her in horrified dismay. "Marguerite!" he cried.  
  
  
  
  
  
To be continued... 


	2. Challenger

Shattered  
  
By Alekto  
  
  
  
Chapter 2  
  
-Challenger-  
  
I wouldn't have believed the extent of Marguerite's determination to find our missing companion back when I first met her. The past two years had mitigated a character that had been prone to selfishness. Now, her concern for Roxton was only too evident. I almost hoped for his sake that some calamity had befallen him; otherwise he would certainly be subject to one of the icy rages that Marguerite did so well for causing her such worry.  
  
"Roxton, where are you?" she called again.  
  
I peered into the dense jungle in front of us, trying in vain to see more than a few yards in. Marguerite was a couple of paces ahead of me when I heard the gunshot. She gave a strangled yelp of pain, twisted and fell.  
  
"Marguerite!" I cried in helpless anguish. My own automatic response was to fire back, but I couldn't make out a target through the thick undergrowth. I fired once in the direction I thought the shot had come from, hoping to flush out whoever had made the shot or perhaps to scare him off.  
  
As I did, the rational, logical side of my mind was puzzling over the significance of who it was being in possession a gun, here on the plateau. At the top of the very short list of options was that it had been one of the guns that John had been carrying, that our mysterious assailant had first encountered Roxton and taken his guns from him. It wasn't a thought that filled me with confidence.  
  
My strategy of firing blindly into the undergrowth seemed to have met with some success when I saw a shadowed figure leave the cover of a fallen tree. I could just about make out the shape of a pistol held in his right hand, and raised my own rifle in turn to cover him as he stepped from the heavy shade where he had been concealed.  
  
Dear God, it was Roxton!  
  
He looked terrible. His face was pallid and sheened in sweat, his eyes intense and fever bright. The left leg of his trousers was ripped with a makeshift bandage wrapped around the limb stained dark with what had to have been blood. It was his expression that worried me the most. I'd known Lord John Roxton for more than two years, and yet I'd never been so aware of the aura of dangerousness that now clung to him like a shroud.  
  
Options ran automatically through my mind. A simulacrum? Coercion? Possession? Certainly, I'd seen him possessed, on several different occasions in fact though admittedly I, too, had been similarly... adversely influenced. Most recently I'd seen, and been threatened by, what could be only described as John's 'dark side' made incarnate. The mysteriously conjured Dark Hunter had been like an automaton or a robot akin to those described in a play I'd seen by Mr. Karel Capek shortly before we'd left London. Its implacability was frighteningly mirrored in Roxton's own gaze.  
  
  
  
But this was no mystical creation. This was different. This was a side of Roxton I'd never seen. During the War I'd seen men who had been invalided home, having been pushed to the limits of endurance and sanity by what they had seen and done. The expression on Roxton's face was hauntingly familiar.  
  
We stared at each other for a long moment. Between us Marguerite lay sprawled unmoving on the ground. I wished I could tell if she were dead, unconscious or shamming. He looked down at her and said something I couldn't quite catch: low growled words in a language I half recognised as Spanish. I could hear the resonance of barely controlled anger in his voice.  
  
With anyone else I would have seized the opportunity when he'd looked away and tried to jump him, but this was John Roxton, and I knew that however quickly I acted, with him, it would never be quickly enough. All I could hope was that Veronica had heard the initial gunshot and was on her way. I couldn't help but berate myself for not guessing that something was amiss when we'd heard the distant gunshots the previous evening. I should have known.  
  
When we'd started off at dawn to look for him, we'd split up into two groups so as to cover more ground. Veronica had followed John's trail while Marguerite and I had headed in the rough direction from which we'd heard last night's gunshots. I hoped Veronica was close. Her presence might swing the balance in our favour.  
  
Now we'd found Roxton, (or more accurately, he having found us) it seemed as if, for whatever reason, John wanted Marguerite dead. I couldn't begin to fathom the reason, or why he'd spoken Spanish. All I could think was that it was something that had happened in the past, before we had met, that none of the rest of us knew about. As a theory, I could take it no further than that.  
  
It seemed an age, but less than ten seconds had passed since Marguerite had been shot.  
  
Roxton's gaze had returned to me and I could see him frowning as if in confusion. "I know you," he muttered, as if trying to convince himself more than anything else.  
  
I felt a brief surge of hope. "Yes, John, it's me, Challenger, George Challenger, don't you remember?" Amnesia? Was that it? I found myself wishing Summerlee were still here. I've never been particularly empathic or intuitive when it came to people: I've felt more comfortable dealing with volatile explosives than I felt trying to talk to Roxton at that moment. Talking to people, winning their confidence had always been one of Arthur's talents. I just wanted to get the situation resolved as quickly as I could so I could check on Marguerite.  
  
It was surprisingly unnerving to see Roxton so unfeeling when I remembered the things he'd gone through to protect Marguerite as well as the rest of us. We'd all become used to trusting him to stand between us and danger. He'd never balked at the task: it was as if he considered himself more expendable then the rest of us. I was ashamed it was something I had almost started to take for granted.  
  
"London, wasn't it?" Roxton's voice was surer now, and I began to breathe a sigh of relief.  
  
"That's right. I'd given a lecture at the Royal Society. You'd volunteered to join the expedition I was proposing - to prove the existence of dinosaurs." I smiled at that last comment. For much of the past two years it had been Roxton who had been our bulwark against the creatures that roamed the plateau. I missed the frown that had returned to his face.  
  
"Dinosaurs?"  
  
I recognised his tone with concern. It rang with the kind of disbelief expressed by my peers that had so enraged me back in London. "That's right. Raptors, pterodactyls, the occasional T-Rex, though how you'd display a head that size, I couldn't begin to guess," I said, trying to trigger some memory. His next words dashed what hope I'd had.  
  
"No! It's wrong. It's all wrong. You don't know me. It's all a lie!"  
  
I could see his growing agitation and took a step forward, raising my arms in an attempt to placate him. My actions only served to anger him further. He raised his gun and pointed it unerringly at me. I halted and let my arms drop back to my sides.  
  
Then both of us heard a low moan from Marguerite. The expression of hatred that crossed Roxton's face at the sound was terrible to see. The gun shifted until it was pointed once again at her. This time I had no choice but to act, whatever the cost.  
  
I lunged forward, grabbing for his gun arm. He fired almost by reflex and the bullet kicked up a small spurt of leaf litter. We wrestled for control of the gun, and for a few brief moments I held out the hope that I might be able to disarm him, then he broke free of my grasp and shoved me away. I stumbled backward, worried for my own safety as well as Marguerite's with Roxton in his current mood. He recovered his equilibrium and levelled the gun once more at Marguerite.  
  
Very deliberately I moved into his line of fire. "You can't do this, John," I said evenly. He looked at me and I could see the anger smouldering in his eyes.  
  
"Get out of the way," he warned, his voice low and dangerous.  
  
I stood my ground. I knew that if...when Roxton came back to his senses, the knowledge that he had hurt Marguerite would be torture to him. If he discovered she was dead, at his hand, it would surely destroy him. Lord John Roxton had as great a capacity for self-recrimination as anyone I'd ever known, and a Roxton guilt-ridden by Marguerite's death would be an easy victim for the predators that hunted the plateau. Even years after the tragic, accidental death of his brother, the mere mention of the incident would bring an ineffable sadness to his face. I could only guess how much worse would it be for him if he killed Marguerite, a woman I sometimes imagined him to be in love with.  
  
"Move, Challenger!" he ordered again.  
  
From behind me I heard Marguerite's faint, uncertain voice. "John?"  
  
"Stay behind me," I murmured, my eyes never leaving Roxton.  
  
"Challenger! What's going on?" she asked and I could clearly make out the slight catch in her voice that betrayed the pain she must have been in. I tried not to think how badly hurt she was, whether we'd be able to heal her, whether we'd be alive to even try.  
  
"Last chance, Challenger!" said Roxton and deep down I knew he wasn't bluffing.  
  
"I'm not moving," I retorted and as I spoke an odd sense of detachment came over me. It was as if by saying the words I'd committed myself to a course of action that I believed could only end in my death.  
  
"Dammit George, what the hell's going on?" demanded Marguerite's weak yet still querulous voice. "Roxton?" she continued hesitantly, and I guessed that she had seen what was happening.  
  
"You won't kill anyone else, you bitch!" Roxton growled at her in reply. "It's over! Finished! You're finished!"  
  
I watched his finger tighten on the trigger.  
  
  
  
  
  
To be continued. 


	3. Veronica

Shattered  
  
By Alekto  
  
  
  
Chapter 3  
  
-Veronica-  
  
The single shot I'd heard warned that something was amiss. Three shots in rapid succession was the signal they were to give if they found him. A single shot probably meant trouble of some sort.  
  
I'd been following Roxton's trail since we'd split up at dawn, all the while having an odd sense of being watched. Challenger would doubtless rubbish the idea of such ESP without empirical proof of some sort, but I'd felt that prickling sensation at the back of my neck before and I trusted it, however unscientific it might be. It had saved my life before now.  
  
About half an hour earlier I'd noticed a change in Roxton's trail. The signs that told of his stealthy progression through the jungle had changed. The imprints I could see now were spaced far apart and showed only the balls of his feet. He'd been running, most likely from something chasing him.  
  
I'd searched the local area for any clue as to what he might have been running from. I'd found what I'd been looking for soon enough: bare footprints, also running. There was no way to tell exactly, but there had been a fair number of them.  
  
I heard a second shot, no more than a minute since the first. It was close. I started running, the long years of practice guiding me almost instinctively to the easiest route through the undergrowth. Ahead I could hear voices, so I slowed, once again paying more attention to stealth than speed.  
  
Peering between the arching fronds of a fern, I saw Challenger, Roxton and Marguerite lying motionless on the ground. My automatic reaction was to join them, but then I noticed that Marguerite was injured, and that Roxton was covering Challenger with his gun. I decided to stay hidden and watch what was going on.  
  
"Get out of the way," I heard Roxton order Challenger. I'd seldom heard such threat in his voice. What had Challenger done to have warranted that? Was it he that had hurt Marguerite? If so, then why was he standing between her and Roxton? Challenger, for whatever reason, refused to move despite Roxton's insistence. Behind him I could see Marguerite begin to stir, her right hand reaching to clutch at her left side where her white blouse was already stained red with blood. "Move, Challenger!" Roxton repeated.  
  
Then I heard Marguerite's voice, faint and thready, "John?"  
  
"Stay behind me," I heard Challenger murmur. Was it that Challenger was trying to protect Marguerite from Roxton? Why? For one brief instant I entertained the idea that it had been Roxton who had shot Marguerite, but quickly dismissed the notion as absurd. The Roxton I knew would be willing to die in his tracks to save Marguerite.  
  
"Challenger! What's going on?" asked Marguerite weakly. At least I wasn't the only one who was confused.  
  
"Last chance, Challenger!" said Roxton. I could feel his determination and knew that Challenger was in real danger, though I still wasn't sure why either of them was facing off against each other.  
  
I saw Challenger steel himself as if he too sensed the danger he was in. "I'm not moving," he said.  
  
"Dammit George, what the hell's going on?" I almost smiled. Even hurt and bleeding Marguerite still sounded undeniably like Marguerite, even if a little quieter than usual. Then, I think for the first time, she noticed who it was that Challenger was trying to protect her from. "Roxton?"  
  
While I watched, an expression of hatred and terrible anger crossed Roxton's face, frightening in its intensity. "You won't kill anyone else, you bitch! It's over! Finished! You're finished!"  
  
I still had no real idea of what was going on, but I knew I couldn't stand by and watch as one of my friends committed murder. I measured the distance, trusted to my skill, and flung my knife at the gun in Roxton's outstretched hand.  
  
My aim was only slightly off, clipping Roxton's hand rather than the gun, but it accomplished the objective. He dropped the gun. Challenger lunged forward to grapple him, but a savage left hook from Roxton sent him reeling backwards. I'd made my move at the same time as Challenger, but had more ground to cover to reach him.  
  
He backed away, pulling out his own knife and holding it firmly in his blood slicked right hand. With a last, frustrated scowl in Marguerite's direction, he turned and was quickly swallowed by the darkness of the jungle.  
  
I went to pick up my knife which had fallen to the ground only a few feet from where Roxton had been standing.  
  
"Thank you, Veronica, timely as always," said Challenger as he turned and knelt to examine Marguerite. For a few moments I stood and listened, alert for any sound that Roxton might have doubled back. There was nothing except a brief, but pained gasp from Marguerite. I crouched next to Challenger ready to offer what help I could.  
  
He moved the blouse out of the way and I could see the torn, discoloured skin and the blood still running down her side. Challenger pulled out his handkerchief, wadded it up and pressed it against her side, eliciting another gasp from Marguerite.  
  
"Challenger," I said quietly "What's happened and what's wrong with Roxton?"  
  
For a long moment, he said nothing as he looked at me then back at Marguerite. It was as if he didn't want to answer the question. I was surprised as I think was Marguerite: reticence was not a characteristic I would normally have associated with Professor George Challenger.  
  
"George?" Marguerite drew out the name, making it a question. Challenger nodded his acquiescence. We both looked at him expectantly, both of us I think hoping that our suspicions were wrong.  
  
"Roxton shot you," he said, never taking his eyes from Marguerite.  
  
I fought back my instinctive denial as I put the facts together in my mind. Marguerite, shot with a gun; Roxton had a gun; I'd seen Roxton pointing the gun at Marguerite. The unthinkable had evidently happened, though as yet I couldn't imagine why. Marguerite, typically, was more forward.  
  
"An obvious question, George. Why?"  
  
"I don't know exactly. I don't think he thought it was you," Challenger began.  
  
"I've been shot, Challenger. I can do without cryptic," interrupted Marguerite acidly.  
  
"He was confused, and if I didn't know better I would have said he was even...scared."  
  
Scared? Roxton? The same Roxton who had stared death in the eye so often here on the plateau and not flinched? It seemed unbelievable, or at the very least disturbingly unlike him. I heard the snort of disbelief from Marguerite echoing my own thoughts.  
  
Challenger continued. "When he first spoke I think it was some form of Spanish. He...he ridiculed the idea of the existence of dinosaurs. He spoke of deaths apparently caused by Marguerite, though logically if he had forgotten the lecture which he attended in London about the existence of dinosaurs on this plateau, he shouldn't have recognised her as they had not met before then. I can only suppose then that he's mistaken Marguerite for someone else, someone whom he seems quite intent on killing."  
  
"And he's out there, injured, armed with nothing more than a knife, and convinced there are no dinosaurs out there," I said. "He'll never survive."  
  
"Roxton has a habit of surviving against the odds," Challenger reminded me, "but now we have to look after Marguerite. I'm no surgeon, but I think she's been relatively fortunate. It looks like the bullet glanced off a rib. A few inches to the left and...well, as I say, you've been fortunate."  
  
"Fortunate?" protested Marguerite. "I've been shot, George! I in no way consider that fortunate!"  
  
I sighed, relieved, knowing how much worse it could have been; as I was sure did Marguerite. "I'll see what I can find to help treat it," I said as I got up and prepared to go. "Professor, keep the rifle close at hand. I don't think Roxton's the only one out there whom you need to look out for."  
  
****  
  
I drifted back into the jungle, searching the dense vegetation for any of the plants I was familiar with whose medicinal qualities might be of help to Marguerite. I couldn't help but remember a talk I'd had with Professor Summerlee after he'd discovered our shared interest in botany. He'd described the jungle as 'a veritable pharmacopoeia that a man could spend a lifetime studying and still have barely scratched the surface of its endless potential to heal or harm'. I'd agreed, and in the time since he'd vanished I tried to continue when I could the work that he'd started.  
  
Even as I searched, I couldn't shake the feeling of being watched. However hard I looked, I could see nothing amiss that would explain it. Then I caught sight of one of the plants I'd been looking for - an unprepossessing weed scrambling across a rare sun-dappled patch on the jungle floor. It had mild antiseptic properties, but its greatest asset was its ease of use as a simple poultice.  
  
An hour or so later I was on my way back to the small clearing where Challenger and Marguerite were waiting. In my absence, Challenger had built a small fire and had cleaned the wound. I boiled some water and added a small handful of twigs I'd collected to stew for a while. The resulting tea was bitter and foul tasting, but it would numb the pain that Marguerite was in.  
  
With Marguerite treated as best as we could manage with the limited resources we had at hand, we set off back to the camp we'd made the previous night. The tree house was too far away to consider trying to get Marguerite back there.  
  
It was a slow journey, but we got there before dusk. The feeling of being watched had eventually receded as we neared our camp, but I was still ill at ease and said as much to Challenger. He merely nodded his agreement, perhaps as unnerved by the encounter with Roxton as was I.  
  
"I'll head out after him at first light," I announced. In many ways Roxton had taken the place of the older brother I'd never had, and I owed it to him to go after him, if only to try to keep him alive.  
  
****  
  
The next day at dawn I set out to hunt Roxton.  
  
I headed back to the clearing where Marguerite had been shot where I'd seen him last. I had no illusions about how difficult it would be to trail him if he'd taken the time to cover his tracks. Of all of them, he was the only one who approached my own knowledge of the jungle and how to survive in it. We were both of us hunters.  
  
To begin with, the trail was relatively easy to follow: he'd obviously been concentrating on putting distance between us. About an hour or so in, the trail quickly became less distinct as he began to pay more attention to the sign he was leaving. My own progress became more cautious, necessitated as much by the increased difficulty of tracking him as for the possibility of an ambush or booby trap.  
  
The trail meandered through the jungle, and I followed, every sense alert for any hint of danger. I soon came upon a place where he must have rested, perhaps spent the night. I found a number of crushed stems from a plant not dissimilar to the aloe whose pulp had some antiseptic qualities. There was no sign of a fire anywhere, so he'd been more worried about being caught than about the danger from raptors. I knew my knife had cut his hand, and I remembered the crude bandage wrapped around his leg. He would probably know the lure the smell of blood held to any predators, even if he wouldn't be expecting raptors.  
  
I continued onward slowly, carefully, as the hours passed. From the scant clues I could find, I decided he was no longer as far in front of me as I'd thought. I guessed whatever had happened to his leg was slowing him down enough for me to have begun to catch up to him.  
  
Then, from not too far ahead I heard shrill, unmistakably triumphant creels cutting through the air. It was a sound I recognised all too well: the sound of raptors on the scent of fresh blood.  
  
  
  
TBC 


	4. Roxton

Shattered  
  
By Alekto  
  
  
  
Author's note: .. indicates a flashback.  
  
  
  
Chapter 4  
  
-Roxton-  
  
When I fled into the jungle, I knew they'd be coming after me.  
  
Looking back on what had happened in the clearing, I had no one to blame but myself. I'd had a chance to kill Dona Maria and I'd failed. She was still alive, and all I could do now was run, and that was something that if I was being honest with myself, I was in no condition to do for long.  
  
I staggered through the jungle, feeling cold and weak, knowing all the while that the jungle was as torrid as it had ever been. My injured leg felt leaden and unsteady: not good considering that my sense of balance had become temperamental at best. I didn't need to be a physician to know that I was in trouble.  
  
Reason took over from instinct and I began to pay more attention to the trail I was leaving. I didn't dare take the time that would have been needed to do a good job of blurring any traces of my passage. The only thing I could do was to minimise the more obvious signs and hope that whomever they sent after me wasn't as good as I feared they would be.  
  
I had to stop for a few seconds to rest, half collapsed against a tree. My leg was trembling, and I had my arms wrapped around my chest in a vain attempt to reduce the shivers that were running through my body. Every gasped breath seemed deafeningly loud, announcing to everyone where I was. Sweat ran down into my eyes, blurring my vision.  
  
I was tired, aching, as I leaned back against the trunk of a tree. My shirt was beyond salvage, bloodstained and torn from the injuries I'd already received. The dark shadow that Oseena had dragged from me was relentless, unstoppable, and I'd done the only thing that had been left to me: I'd run. I was the one who had, rightly or wrongly, incurred Oseena's wrath, and I'd be damned if I was going to let one of the others get hurt any more because of me.  
  
Especially Marguerite.  
  
I'd fled the tree house to try to lead him away from my friends, from her. She'd followed and been caught by him. I'd tried to rescue her, but he'd shot me in the leg. He'd dragged her away and all I'd been able to do was scream her name.   
  
Marguerite... I tried to match a face to the name, but couldn't. I felt an inexplicable pang at the loss.  
  
Then I heard the sound of something crashing through the jungle, making no attempt at stealth. Fear sharpened my senses and I could make out more movement from other directions. I was being surrounded, but by what, I couldn't imagine. Shrill, inhuman screeches cut through the thick, humid air. It was a noise I knew I hadn't heard before, but which nonetheless evoked the mental image of some sort of bipedal reptile, taller than a man but fast, agile and dangerous.  
  
It was disconcerting this knowing that I was in danger but not knowing how I knew. Adrenaline lent me the surge of strength I needed to run to a climbable tree and haul myself up into its branches. I saw one of the creatures push past the undergrowth into the open ground below the tree. I noted without surprise that somehow it looked exactly as I had expected it to look.  
  
A dinosaur? I recalled what Challenger had said to me about dinosaurs being real. A part of me couldn't help but wonder if it was a hallucination brought on by the fever caused by the gash on my leg which I knew was infected. It would explain the presence of what appeared to be an actual, living dinosaur.  
  
On the other hand, I'd heard enough strange stories from the depths of both the Congo and the Amazon that I couldn't disregard the possibility, however remote, that what I was seeing might in fact be real.  
  
Moments later, more of the creatures appeared. I scrambled higher and found myself in a comfortable hollow some twenty or thirty feet from the ground. From the jungle floor I could hear the cries of the creatures and the scrabbling as they tried in vain to reach me. I watched as the head of one of the creatures whipped around snake fast, looking back into the jungle. From my vantage point I could make out the flash of blond hair and tanned skin - the woman who had thrown the knife at me.  
  
She evidently realised the danger she was in as she turned and sped off through the jungle. The creatures gathered around the base of the tree quickly lost their interest in me and bounded after her.  
  
The adrenaline rush which had carried me up into the branches was fading fast and I couldn't help the tremors that raced through my body. My hands were shaking so much that it took several attempts to untie the crude bandage around the wound on my thigh. Whatever half remembered inspiration had convinced me to treat it using the plant I'd seen appeared to have done no harm, and perhaps even some good. The leg still felt hot to the touch and the edges of the gash remained the same sickly yellow green. The makeshift bandage was filthy, encrusted with coagulated blood and stained with either pus or sap from the plant, but I didn't want to know which. By some miracle, the knife wound on my hand was still clean and showed no sign of infection.  
  
It was little consolation as I slumped back into the hollow in the tree and sank into an exhausted, fever-ridden stupor.  
  
****  
  
I eventually awoke from a seemingly endless parade of nightmares: William's death, the hell of the trenches, being imprisoned following the Parsifal business, Dona Maria's delighted laughter as her men beat me...  
  
Running through the jungle being pursued by a T-Rex?  
  
Chained in an arena, battling some sort of lizard men?  
  
I didn't pretend to understand where those latter images came from - my nightmares generally didn't end up being quite so surreal. I rubbed a weary hand across my face, feeling the roughness of several days' worth of stubble. The gash on my leg had been exposed to the air while I had been lost in the worst of the delirium. The soft, purulent flesh around the wound had finally started to dry out. It looked like the worst was probably over, but it still ached miserably.  
  
It took several minutes of careful manoeuvring to get down the tree without jarring my leg too badly. I listened but heard no hint of the 'dinosaurs', for want of a better word. I'd begun to believe that they had been hallucinations until I noticed the all too obvious prints they'd left around the base of the tree.  
  
So, they were real. Challenger hadn't been lying about their existence. He'd also said that I was part of an expedition, an expedition he'd led to prove that dinosaurs still existed. Had he been lying about that?  
  
I had no answers, at least not yet.  
  
I looked around, trying to get my bearings. The sun was high overhead, its light filtered by the forest canopy. On the ground amongst the dinosaur's tracks I saw my own trail leading to the tree. It was the only clue I had as to the direction I'd been heading in before I'd been forced to seek refuge. Under the circumstances, I had no better ideas as to where to head, so I continued in the same direction.  
  
The first order of business was to find food and water. In the past I'd spent enough time travelling through jungles to have picked up a fair amount on how to survive in them. Before long I'd found what I'd been looking for. Simpson's on the Strand had nothing to worry about; but I had to admit the results of my foraging at that moment tasted as good as any of that noted restaurant's haute cuisine.  
  
I was just filling the canteen I had with me when I heard the cries of birds startled into the air from the direction I'd come from. It was very definitely time to go.  
  
****  
  
Hours passed and whoever my pursuers were, I was managing to keep ahead of them. I was half tempted to try to hide up somewhere, and either let them pass or ambush one of them, but always my mind went back to the thought of what happened if it went wrong, of being captured again by Dona Maria.  
  
I'd known a great many people of less than sterling character. A few had even become friends of a sort. I was thankful that I'd met few people who I could actually consider as being unrepentantly evil. Dona Maria was one of them, and I had a good idea of what would happen if I fell into her hands.  
  
Being captured, I decided, was not an option.  
  
****  
  
It was late afternoon when the jungle gave way to open, rocky ground. Going by the sounds of the jungle as well as my own instincts, I knew that my pursuers were still following. I was tired of running, of being afraid, of surviving when so many friends hadn't. I looked ahead across the rubble strewn ground. A hundred yards or so from the tree line the ground dropped away into a chasm.  
  
I limped over to the edge of the chasm and glanced down. The sheer walls of the chasm dropped away and all I could see far below was a swirling mist. Good enough. If it came down to it and I was going to die, I was going to make damn sure I took Dona Maria with me.  
  
It wasn't long before my pursuers left the cover of the jungle. There were only three of them: Challenger, the blond woman and between them, looking pale but very definitely alive was Dona Maria. The blond carried only a knife but the other two were armed with rifles and handguns.  
  
But still, there were only three of them. I wondered where the rest of Dona Maria's men were. It was unlike her to have so small an escort. All I could guess was that they were still hidden, waiting for her orders.  
  
They approached with laudable caution. I almost felt like laughing given the disparity between the three of them, well armed and apart from Dona Maria, uninjured, and myself. I was exhausted, wounded and armed only with a knife, but they were still paying me the compliment of believing I was a threat. I backed away, closer and closer to the edge of the cliff. They halted some twenty feet from me. Dona Maria took one more step, and then asked softly, hesitantly: "Roxton?"  
  
"How many more deaths will it take to convince you of my sincerity, Roxton! Surrender or I'll kill every man, woman and child in this village." I could hear the triumphant vindictiveness in Dona Maria's voice as she presented her ultimatum.  
  
The people of the village who had offered me aid and sanctuary were gathered in a huddle under the guns of twenty of Dona Maria's paid thugs while I was hidden in the forest overlooking the village. A single shot rang out, a body fell, and I flinched as if it had been I who had been shot. A wordless moan of grief and fear rose from the remaining villagers.  
  
"A woman next, or perhaps a child," she suggested, and I looked on in horror as a boy was dragged screaming from his parents' arms. Her men pushed the struggling child to his knees as she levelled her gun at his head. "Last chance!" she taunted.  
  
It was enough. "No, wait!" I shouted as I left the cover of the forest, the rifle held above my head in surrender. Within seconds I was surrounded and disarmed. They pushed me to my knees and bound my arms with casual brutality.  
  
Dona Maria glided towards me, a coquettish moue on her face. She leaned down, cupped my chin in her hand and forced a kiss. I couldn't hide my revulsion, much to the amusement of the men holding me on my knees. She stepped away from me shaking her head as if in disappointment. "It seems you need some incentive," she murmured, then turned to the men who were still holding the boy. "Kill him!"  
  
"No, don't hurt him! I'll do whatever you want," I pleaded.  
  
She looked down at me and smiled. "Yes, you will," she purred, and in her gaze all I saw was the long awaited retribution she had promised me. I tried not to think what that twisted mind could come up with.   
  
"Roxton?" she asked again moving closer until she standing as close to the cliff edge as I, no more than five feet away from me. "Don't you know me?"  
  
"I know you," I replied evenly, watching her. Out of the corner of my eye I could see the others, waiting where they were, poised and ready to intervene.  
  
"We've been worried about you," she began, trying to smile but managing little more than a nervous grimace.  
  
"I've survived worse," I pointed out dryly.  
  
"I know," she agreed quietly and I was surprised to hear the depth of compassion that was in her voice. She reached out a hand to me, "come back with us."  
  
For a long moment I looked into her eyes, and then the ground began to shake to the approaching rhythmic tread of something huge. "T-Rex!" the blond said warningly.  
  
I watched as Challenger readied his rifle as an impossibly massive shape pushed its way through the jungle. From beside me I heard a cry of alarm as the edge of the cliff began to crumble. I turned and saw the fear in her eyes as the ground she was standing on began to slide into the chasm, and instinctively grabbed for her outstretched arm.  
  
  
  
TBC 


	5. Marguerite

Shattered  
  
By Alekto  
  
  
  
Author's note: .. indicates a flashback. Spoiler alert for the episode "Eye for an Eye" from season 3.  
  
  
  
Chapter 5  
  
-Marguerite-  
  
Roxton had shot me.  
  
Over long years I'd grown used to the idea of betrayal, of the idea that a friend or ally of one day would slip a knife in your back the next. I'd once been so used to expecting the worst of people.  
  
When had that changed? Why was it that I hadn't expected, hadn't even imagined, that this man could do something like that?  
  
He'd shot me. He'd tried to kill me. The cynic in me was surprised that I was finding it so annoyingly hard to accept.  
  
Challenger had said there had been something strange about him, had theorised that he had amnesia or something. If that was right, why had he decided to try to kill me? I had too many questions that could not be answered by Challenger's theories.  
  
They were questions that only Roxton could answer. We had to go after him. As Veronica had pointed out, hurt and armed with nothing more than a knife Roxton was in considerable danger from predators of the jungle. He was part of the expedition. We'd miss his skill and presence. We needed him. I... needed him.  
  
Damn the man for getting to me like that. I'd never liked feeling vulnerable. It didn't change the fact, though, that whatever else happened, I was going after him.  
  
****  
  
Veronica led us to the place where she'd encountered a pack of raptors. She said that they'd treed someone; someone she believed had been Roxton. It gave her somewhere to look for his trail and for someone of Veronica's skill that had been all she'd needed.  
  
We'd headed warily through the jungle. I think the memory of Roxton's 'dark side' getting the jump on us not so long ago was as clear in Veronica's mind as it was in my own. Wounded he might have been, but none of us were going to make the mistake of believing that made him any less dangerous.  
  
The wound on my side was throbbing painfully with every step. Thinking about it rationally, I probably should have still been resting but that would have meant only more delay in going after him, so I carried on walking fuelled by a mixture equal parts anger, determination and worry. Endless scenarios of what I would say when we finally caught up with him ran through my mind...  
  
-Hi, John, it's okay: you missed, I'm still alive.  
  
-Hi, you tried to kill me but don't worry about it.  
  
-Dammit John, you shot me!  
  
I was distracted enough that I hadn't noticed that in front of me Challenger and Veronica had stopped. "We'll take a short break, I think," suggested Challenger looking pointedly at me.  
  
"Don't feel you have to on my account," I retorted, possibly more sharply than I'd intended.  
  
"Marguerite," he said, "you're pushing yourself too hard. You won't do anyone any good if you collapse and we have to carry you." I recognised the tone: it was Challenger's 'reasonable' voice, the one he used when he wanted to convince you of the usefulness of his latest invention despite any misgivings you might have about it. I grudgingly admitted to myself that I was too tired to argue, so we rested awhile.  
  
Half an hour had passed before we decided to start off again. I stood up, fought back the rush of dizziness that the sudden movement had generated, picked up the rifle and headed after Veronica as she went back to following Roxton's trail.  
  
A couple more hours passed and ahead I could see the jungle thinning out to reveal a stretch of rubble strewn wasteland, too rocky for any but the smallest plants to scrape a living. A hundred yards away at what appeared to be the lip of a precipice stood Roxton, finally brought to bay.  
  
For a moment we all just stared at each other. He looked sick and weary, like a man pushed to his limit and then beyond. His evident pallor was only accentuated by the stubble on his face. He stood there waiting for us, his stance wary and poised as if he was expecting an attack, though there was no mistaking that he was favouring his obviously injured left leg.  
  
We closed the distance between us with slow, cautious steps. He backed away slowly until I felt sure his next backward step would send him plummeting to his death. Out of the corner of my eyes I could see Challenger and Veronica halt, by tacit agreement leaving me to confront Roxton. I took a few more careful steps towards him, trying to read his intentions. "Roxton?" I murmured, unsure of what I could say.  
  
What I saw worried me. Apart from the few occasions when something I'd said had caught him unawares, he displayed a cheerful opacity to the world. I looked into his face as he stood there on the edge and saw a depth of pain and fear and anguish married with an aura of sheer determination of terrifying intensity. I'd seen that expression before on the faces of men who knew they were going to die. It scared me to see it on his face as we stood so close to the edge of the precipice, because for the first time since I'd known him I had a sense of despair from Lord John Roxton.  
  
I suddenly remembered Challenger's words when I asked why he thought Roxton had shot me: 'I don't think he thought it was you... I can only suppose that he's mistaken you for someone else, someone he seems quite intent on killing'. It made an odd sort of sense. I got the sense of some sort of recognition from Roxton, but it was full of hatred, a hatred he'd never directed at me before. He and I had certainly had our differences but never had he looked at me with anything approaching that sort of outright disdain.  
  
I swallowed my own fear, fighting to concentrate despite the nagging pain from my side. "Roxton?" I asked as I moved even closer to him. "Don't you know me?" I watched his face, praying for some glimmer of the Roxton I knew.  
  
He'd been injured even before he'd accepted the challenge thrown down by his 'dark side' to try to take him hand to hand. There had been nothing I could do except shout. He had been too weak, too badly hurt, but still he'd come to the dinosaurs' graveyard to try and rescue me. Now he was facing the appalling strength of his relentless doppelganger and losing.  
  
I was caught between sobbing with frustration and screaming encouragement as I struggled frantically to free myself from the cords that held me to the gigantic rib bone Roxton's twin had tied me to. Roxton himself looked such a mess: tired, filthy, his shirt torn and bloodstained beyond any hope of repair, and limping badly from where he had been shot. He was still trying to protect me, just as he had so many times before.  
  
I watched as he caught the doppelganger with an impromptu club, bludgeoned it to the ground, raised the weapon for the final blow that would dispatch it, then, inexplicably, he paused. "Kill him!" I screamed out to him. "Kill him!"  
  
He muttered something I couldn't hear and with an effort pushed himself away from his downed adversary. I could almost have cried in utter disbelief. "What are you doing? Roxton!" He took a few unsteady steps away from his opponent then collapsed. I finally managed to twist my hands free and ran over to where he lay. I knelt down and cradled his head on my lap. "Roxton! Roxton, say something!" I begged.  
  
He opened his eyes and smiled weakly up at me. "What's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?" I could only laugh in relief.   
  
I gazed into his eyes, looking for the man I knew. I couldn't find him. The face was Roxton's as was the voice when he relied steadily: "I know you." I had the horrible impression that it wasn't me, Marguerite Krux that he was professing to know.  
  
"We've been worried about you," I said, deciding to try another tack. My own nervousness made my voice shake. I was afraid for him, I realised.  
  
"I've survived worse," he replied refusing to acknowledge the concern I'd voiced, but I could hear the truth in his words. When it came down to it, he was a survivor, but I couldn't forget the distant flicker of despair I'd seen in his eyes and that added to the proximity of the chasm scared me.  
  
"I know," I replied. I knew the things he'd survived in the time we'd been on the plateau. Too often I'd seen him exhausted, injured and in pain and nursed him back to health. I'd seen the scars from older injuries on his body, mute testimony to events he'd survived. I reached out a hand to him. "Come back with us," I asked, willing him to listen to me, to trust me.  
  
He stared, unmoving for what seemed like an eternity and all the time I was horribly aware that less than two steps away the ground dropped away into an abyss. I fought against the instinct that urged me to back away from him and run for safety. However mistaken he might have been about my identity, it still looked like he wanted whomever he thought I was dead in the worst possible way. The knowledge did not engender a feeling of security.  
  
The moment was broken by an approaching rhythmical thud felt through the ground as much as heard, and that could be only one thing: T-Rex. I heard Veronica's confirmation of what I had already guessed and then returned my gaze to Roxton, my hand still outstretched.  
  
He glanced from me, over to the tree line, then back to me. I was about to say something. Anything to try to convince him of the need to flee when I felt the ground beneath my feet begin to give way. I tried to step back but I missed my footing and the step turned into a desperate scrabble for anything firm to hold on to.  
  
Then I felt a hand grasp hold of my wrist, and I convulsively grabbed hold of it in return. It was just in time as the area of ground I had been standing on slid down into the chasm. The grip on my wrist was the only thing stopping my fall as the jerk of my full weight came down on it. My side was suddenly ablaze with fresh pain at the unexpected strain and I fought back the feeling of dizziness and nausea.  
  
I looked up into Roxton's taut features and could not help but see the crude bandage that was wrapped around the hand holding on to my wrist begin to darken with fresh blood. "Roxton!" I screamed as much in pain as fear.  
  
His eyes met mine, and for the barest instant rather than hatred I saw only confusion, then his jaw clenched in determination and he started to try and haul me back onto solid ground. Veronica reached down to grab my other hand and between them they managed to drag me back onto level ground. Veronica got up and sped off to join Challenger as he prepared to stand off the T-Rex. Roxton and I were too spent to do anything except crawl away from the edge.  
  
"We've got to get out of here!" yelled Challenger over the ever louder crashing sound of the T-Rex pushing through the dense jungle.  
  
"Thank you George that thought had already occurred to me!" I retorted tartly, but I knew he was right and took a few deep if painful breaths while I tried to find the strength to get to my feet.  
  
A tentative hand touched my arm, and I turned to see Roxton looking at me, a frown on his face. "Marguerite?" he whispered uncertainly.  
  
I nodded wordlessly, caught between laughing and crying in sheer relief.  
  
"Marguerite! You're Marguerite!" he breathed, and a weary, yet wonderfully familiar smile transformed his face only to fade as his gaze dropped to the bloodied bandage pressed against my side.  
  
Whatever he was about to say was cut short by Challenger's interruption. He pulled me to my feet with his left arm. "Dammit, Roxton, get moving!" he shouted at him. "We have to make a run for it now - Veronica can't keep that thing occupied forever!"  
  
I glanced back and saw Veronica engaged in a terrifying game of tag with the hulking T-Rex. I was leaning on Challenger for support, unable so much as to stand unaided. Roxton struggled to his feet and managed a few steps only to have his injured leg fold under him depositing him unceremoniously on the ground.  
  
I heard a soft muttered imprecation from Challenger, and couldn't help but agree. There was no escaping the fact that we were all in a great deal of trouble.  
  
  
  
TBC 


	6. Roxton

Shattered  
  
By Alekto  
  
  
  
Chapter 6  
  
-Roxton-  
  
It had been nothing more than sheer instinct that had made me grab at her arm as she began to fall. Ironic, I suppose, when you think that I had planned on taking her over the cliff with me, only to find myself the only thing stopping her from plummeting to her death.  
  
I was spread-eagled on the edge of the cliff, my right hand gripping her wrist, my left clinging onto a rock as an anchor. The blaze of pain and the dampness that had nothing to do with sweat on my hand warned that the wound made by the blonde's knife was bleeding. Our combined weights were pressing my still inflamed leg wound against the rough edged rock. My head was pounding with a sudden headache of agonising proportions.  
  
"Roxton!" she screamed. I looked beyond our clenched hands, beyond the sight of my blood beginning to dribble from under the bandage on my hand down her arm. It was nothing more than incidental as I looked into her face.  
  
In that moment there was one thing I was suddenly very sure of. This wasn't Dona Maria. The face was so familiar, but it wasn't hers. It was someone else, someone important, someone called... The memory skirted close then was gone. I took a breath, ignored the pain in my hand, leg and head and concentrated what strength I had left to pulling her up.  
  
Pain has an odd way of stretching out time. It couldn't have taken more than a minute to pull her up and to roll away from the edge, but it had seemed like hours. I collapsed on my back heedless of the roughness of the stony ground I was lying on. The pain from my injuries emanated out in waves apace with my heart beat. My right hand was curled half closed as if arthritic, swathed in a blood sodden bandage. At that moment I couldn't muster the energy to look at my leg. I felt tired enough to lie there for days.  
  
"We've got to get out of here!" Challenger called out. Even if I hadn't been able to feel the reverberation of the dinosaur's tread through the ground, the alarm and urgency in Challenger's voice would have been enough.  
  
  
  
"Thank you George that thought had already occurred to me!" I heard the woman reply from where she was slumped nearby. I took a few precious seconds to catch my breath before pulling myself up to my hands and knees, promising myself that if I got out of there I would sleep an entire day. I thought longingly of my bed in the tree house.  
  
The tree house? An image of the place sprang into my mind along with an impression of it being home for me as it had long been home for the blonde. Veronica. The blonde was called Veronica! In my mind's eye I saw other faces and felt an undeniable sense of family from them, and perhaps in one case, something far more...  
  
  
  
I'd thought to be trapped in Askwith's nightmarish past had been bad enough, but things had just taken a turn for the worse. Challenger and I had attacked a Royal Navy Captain - a hanging offence last time I'd checked - and that Captain had recovered too quickly for comfort.  
  
I looked at his face, saw his outrage at our actions intermingled with the inevitable strain from the war. There was something darker there as well, something ruthless that was only now peering out from beneath the civilised veneer. I'd seen it before too many times not to recognise it and know that this was a man for whom the ends would always justify the means. The gun in his hand was, I knew, no idle threat.  
  
Behind him I could see Marguerite fumbling for something on the table behind her. In his chauvinistic arrogance the Captain was ignoring her - always a dangerous mistake where Marguerite was concerned. I was caught between warning her off for her own safety and the undeniable knowledge that if we didn't get out of there, we'd likely be as trapped as Askwith had been.  
  
I saw Marguerite lift something green and solid from the table. Maybe she made some noise; maybe the Captain saw some reaction to her movement in our eyes. Whatever it was gave her away, he turned before she could strike and coolly shot her in the chest.  
  
"Marguerite!" The scream was wrenched from my throat. I saw her confused frown, and the fire that had always been in her eyes, began to fade.  
  
"Stay where you are," the Captain barked out, "unless you wish to be next!"  
  
Next? I didn't care. I watched as Marguerite slid dying to the ground, and as she did a part of me went with her. I could dimly feel Challenger's restraining arm, but it didn't matter anymore. Nothing mattered anymore.  
  
"If you haven't noticed, I am the one with the weapon," drawled the Captain superciliously.  
  
As far as I was concerned, that was an irrelevant detail. I circled around, to be with Marguerite one last time, to say goodbye. After that, I had just one thing left to do. "Nothing will save you from me," I promised softly as I stared into her murderer's eyes.  
  
"Roxton, this isn't real," Challenger warned.  
  
Not real? I'd seen the bullet hit her. I'd seen her die. I wanted it not to be real more than anything else, but I couldn't deny the evidence of my own eyes. "Marguerite's dead, Challenger! We've changed the pattern of events: you've said it yourself."  
  
The Captain glanced between us. "You're mad as March hares," he muttered.  
  
Then, impossibly, I heard a groan from Marguerite. Heedless of the threat of the Captain's gun I crouched next to her as she struggled to sit up. My mind was in turmoil as hope warred with disbelief. "I thought I'd lost you," I breathed as hope won out.   
  
  
  
I reached out to touch her arm, unsure of whether she was dream or reality. She turned at my touch, her face the face that for days had eluded me. Only now could I see. "Marguerite?" I whispered, wanting confirmation but at the same time dreading that I might have been mistaken.  
  
She nodded. "Marguerite! You're Marguerite!" I couldn't help repeating the name. She was real. I looked at her, drinking in every contour of her face. My gaze dropped down her body and halted at the unsightly bulge made by bandages wadded up against her side, bandages that were stained with blood.  
  
I remembered what had happened to cause that and felt a stab of terrible anguish that was worse than all the pain from the injuries had ever been.  
  
I'd tried to kill Marguerite.  
  
"Dammit, Roxton, get moving!" Challenger's harsh words dragged me from my lapse into self recrimination. "We have to make a run for it now. Veronica can't keep that thing occupied forever!"  
  
In response to his words I looked over to see Veronica pitting her wits and nimbleness against the juggernaut that was the T-Rex, and for the moment at least, diverting its attention from the rest of us. Challenger was right: no one could keep that sort of dance up forever. I saw the fey smile on her face as she pushed her skill and speed to the limit. In that instant I knew how she felt: the exultation and excitement of taking the sorts of risks that could get you killed was oddly addictive.  
  
His rifle held in his right hand, Challenger leaned down to help Marguerite to her feet with his left. She leaned heavily against him for support, and I could see the fierce determination in her eyes as she threw every ounce of strength she had into staying conscious and standing. He looked askance at me and I nodded with a confidence I didn't really feel, but I knew he couldn't support both of us. Getting Marguerite to safety was the most important thing anyway.  
  
He started moving away and I took a couple of deep breaths, steeling myself for the effort to get to my feet. The blackness of unconsciousness danced at the edge of my vision as I staggered to my feet, leaning heavily on my uninjured right leg. The effort left me feeling light headed and panting for breath. The exertion must have reopened the half-healed gash on my leg and I could feel the dampness of fresh blood.  
  
The adrenaline or determination or whatever that had given me the strength to pull Marguerite back from the cliff was fading, eclipsed by the agony that was every step. Blood loss was making me light headed, and I tried with a fumbling hand to retie the bandage around my right hand. I couldn't. The mere act of looking down sent a wave of dizziness and nausea through my head. I reeled, fighting to keep my balance in a world that to my mind no longer seemed to have an up or down. My leg flared with pain at the next step and then gave way. It was as much as I could do not to cry out as I crashed to the ground.  
  
I sat there trying to recover what equanimity I could. The tremors caused by every stride of the T-Rex were even more apparent now and from far below I could hear a low grumbling as if the ground itself was protesting the heavy tread. I thought I heard Challenger mutter something under his breath, quickly followed by a gasp as he watched Veronica dodge the T-Rex's flailing tail by the merest margin  
  
"Give me the rifle, George," I called out. Challenger turned to look at me, but made no move to hand it over. "You can't carry both of us, so give me the damned rifle and get Marguerite and Veronica out of here. I'll try and distract it long enough for you to get clear. You know if you have to wait for me, it'll only slow you down enough to get us all killed."  
  
I saw the indecision in Challenger's face as he considered the facts. The logic of saving the three of them warred with what he would doubtless take to be the iniquity of leaving someone behind to face a T-Rex on their own. Before he could say anything, Marguerite cut in. "John, no!" Then more angrily, "I didn't go traipsing through the jungle just to leave you here to get eaten by a dinosaur."  
  
"I can't even stand up, let alone get away," I replied, then added more softly. "Please, Marguerite, it's the only way. Let me do this for you. I couldn't bear it if you died as well."  
  
"But I'm supposed to let you die instead, is that it? Well I'm sorry, but the answer's 'no'. Either we all get out of this or that T-Rex gets an entrée to go with its hors d'oeuvre. I don't actually want to be on its menu, so unless you want another death on your conscience, you'll get up and get moving right now!"  
  
I saw the stubborn set to her jaw and the tears glistening in her eyes. She meant what she said. I sighed. Why was it Marguerite never took the easy option when it was offered? "Give me the rifle then, Challenger," I said wearily, and then continued as I saw the protests begin to well up in both their faces. "No, I'm not going to do Roxton's Last Stand. I just need something to lean on if I'm going to try and walk."  
  
Challenger nodded and handed me the rifle. Before she turned away to let Challenger help her into the cover of the trees, I saw a glimmer of suspicion in Marguerite's eyes at my motives for wanting the gun.  
  
Using the rifle as a crutch, I levered myself to my feet. I wasn't too keen on the idea of abusing the gun in that way, but it was the only thing to hand. A few paces ahead of me I could see Challenger as he made his way to the tree line, supporting Marguerite more and more with every step. My entire focus settled on them and putting one foot in front of the other, every other step rewarded with a stab of pain shooting up my leg. The makeshift crutch had given me the balance I'd needed, but the tree line seemed so impossibly far away.  
  
A startled yelp from Veronica prompted me to turn and I saw what I had feared since I had first seen her trying to distract the T-Rex: she was clutching her arm to her side and her once fluid movements were slower, more cautious. The dinosaur towered at the edge of the cliff where I had stood not long since, roaring its frustration for all to hear. In front of me I could see that Challenger and Marguerite had made it to the protection of the tree line that I was still some thirty feet away from. At the speed I was going it might as well have been a mile.  
  
I took a moment to get balanced, then swung Challenger's rifle to point at the dinosaur. My right hand shook as I forced myself to hold the gun steady, reassured that accuracy was for once not so important. The T-Rex made a big target. With far less smoothness than I would have liked, I fired. The bullet caught the dinosaur and it turned to look in my direction.  
  
"Veronica. Run!" I yelled. She paused for barely a moment then turned and made for cover as I continued shouting, trying to distract the beast's attention from her, from Challenger and Marguerite and towards me. It swung its heavy head in my direction and I loosed the second barrel.  
  
Dimly, I noticed that the others had reached the thick cover of the jungle. I felt the ground shake as the T-Rex lumbered into a run towards me. I had nothing with which to reload the rifle, not that anything smaller than an artillery shell would have stopped that beast. From the jungle behind me I heard a wordless cry of anguish.  
  
I looked up into the maw of the charging juggernaut, oddly calm now that I was out of options. I consoled myself with the thought that at least Marguerite was safe.  
  
"Roxton!" I heard her voice: half sob, half scream.  
  
The T-Rex was almost upon me. There was nothing I could do.  
  
*I'm sorry Marguerite. Goodbye.*  
  
  
  
  
  
TBC 


	7. Marguerite

Shattered  
  
By Alekto  
  
  
  
Chapter 7  
  
-Marguerite-  
  
He'd done it again, put himself in harm's way to protect us as he had so very many times before. The familiarity of it didn't make his decision any easier for me to bear.  
  
I'd been leaning heavily on Challenger for support trusting that Roxton's own strength and determination would carry him to the relative safety of the tree line. I'd seen him collapse, seen his pallor and the tension in his face as he fought the pain and tried to follow us.  
  
To be honest, I should have seen it coming. His offer to take Challenger's rifle and stay behind to give us a better chance of escape had been so like him it made my heart ache to see. The John Roxton that I lo--, that I'd missed, was back. Now he seemed to want to throw his life away to save us. Again.  
  
There was only one slight problem: I had no intention of letting him do it. I'd threatened to stay behind with him, and he'd realised, correctly, that I was stubborn enough to have done it. For some reason it annoyed him that I had refused to stand by and just watch him die.  
  
However, once I'd explained the situation to him, he'd appeared to have changed his mind about staying, taken the rifle as a crutch rather than a weapon, and tried to follow Challenger and me to safety. I've been called manipulative in the past, admittedly with good cause for the most part, but I knew Roxton well enough to have known how to convince him to at least try to escape. I knew the guilt he carried around with him, the driving sense of responsibility, and I played on it.  
  
It worked, but whatever joy I'd felt when I'd seen him haul himself to his feet and stagger after us had been tempered with regret at seeing in his eyes the never quite exorcised shadow of other deaths that, rightly or wrongly, he held himself responsible for.  
  
Finally, after what had seemed an eternity of putting one foot in front of another, Challenger and I made it to the tree line. I glanced at Challenger to see he was nearly as winded as I. It wasn't too surprising: on the last few yards he'd been virtually carrying me. Once released of his support, I slumped down against a tree trunk, wincing at the flare of pain from my side that the movement caused. Almost involuntarily my hand went to the wadded bandage, and came away red. I looked at it uncomprehendingly for a moment, my brain numbed by what had to have been stress or blood loss or shock.  
  
Veronica's startled yelp dragged my concentration back into the present. I saw her holding her arm as if in pain. The T-Rex towered between her slight form and the edge of the cliff. I prayed for it to go over as surely Veronica had been intending: a fall from a great height was still one of the best ways of getting rid of a T-Rex that we'd come across, but it was not to be. I looked on, the breath caught in my throat, as I waited for the T-Rex to strike.  
  
The harsh sound of a sudden gunshot made me jump, and I automatically looked in the direction it had come from.  
  
Roxton. He was stood there, the rifle held somewhat awkwardly, but nonetheless pointed at the T-Rex which had turned in annoyance at what, to it, must have been an annoying gnat sting to its flank. I distantly noticed that Veronica had been quick-witted enough to advantage of the opportunity offered to race for cover even before Roxton had yelled, "Veronica. Run!"  
  
He'd continued shouting: wordless noise intended only to divert the creature's attention from Veronica's retreat and towards him. I saw it waver as if undecided, then as its head swung back in Roxton's direction I saw him fire again. I couldn't see where the bullet had hit, if it had hit. I waited for him to fire again before my exhaustion dulled mind noted that Roxton was carrying Challenger's double-ejector rather than his own bolt-action and he hadn't any cartridges with which to reload it.  
  
I watched as the dinosaur roared again then lowered its head to charge down the tiny figure who had the temerity to so defy it. I saw Roxton standing there, no more than ten or twelve yards away from Challenger or I, swaying a little but making no effort to dodge. 'Damn him! Why didn't he do something?' I raged inwardly despite being able to see that it was as much as he could do to remain standing. The ground itself groaned under the relentless pounding of the dinosaur's feet, the tremors created by every step carried to where Challenger and I were hiding.  
  
"Roxton!" I cried, anguish making my voice crack. He half turned towards me at the sound of my voice before returning his gaze to the charging T- Rex, determined it seemed to meet his impending death with the same courage he had shown in life. "No, no, no, no, no..." I sobbed under my breath, helplessly trying to deny what was happening in front of me. Was I supposed to just wait there and watch as it killed him? What could I do?  
  
I racked my brain for an idea, any idea that might help. Nothing. I turned with scant hope to Challenger who was watching what was happening, as transfixed as was I. "George?" I beseeched quietly, desperately, in the hope that he could bring off yet another miracle.  
  
He didn't look at me, didn't say anything, perhaps angry that he, for all his learning and inventions could do nothing to save his friend's life. Behind his scientific detachment, I sometimes forgot that Challenger, too, was human.  
  
"Roxton!" I screamed again, wanting to turn away but somehow unable to.  
  
The T-Rex was no more than ten yards from him when Challenger turned to me and hissed urgently, "listen!"  
  
For an instant I had no idea what he meant. Then I heard it: a grumbling from under the ground, so low as to be almost inaudible. I remembered the instability at the cliff edge that had so nearly sent me tumbling into the abyss. That had been caused by the vibration from the dinosaur's approach. If the whole area near the cliff edge was that unstable...  
  
The dinosaur forgot about its attack on Roxton, reeling as if drunk. It would have been comical if I hadn't been so scared. Roxton, too, staggered.  
  
"Landslide!" bawled Challenger over the ever louder rumbling from the ground.  
  
"Run! Dammit, John, hurry!" I called, dragging myself to my feet with the aid of the tree for support. The pain in my side was nothing more than a distraction, an irrelevance, to be ignored for a while at least.  
  
I started towards him but Challenger grabbed my arm. "Wait here," he ordered peremptorily. "You're in no condition and I can't carry both of you." I started to protest but a sudden wave of nausea convinced me of Challenger's reasoning.  
  
Cracks were racing across the ground, parallel to the cliff edge. The whole ground was shaking and I clung to a tree branch, praying that it wouldn't fall away too. Challenger staggered and stumbled out towards Roxton who had finally lost his battle to remain standing. He hauled him to his feet and they began to make their way back, supporting each other like two old men on their way home from a night's drinking.  
  
Behind them I could see the T-Rex, its own strength and power helpless in the end to save it from its slow slide into the abyss. I saw it fling its head back, bellow a last defiant roar, then it fell from view. The cracks widened and whole slabs of ground sheared away and vanished into the depths of the chasm.  
  
Challenger and Roxton were no more than ten feet from the support of the dense trees when the ground they were on began to slide away. I could see the realisation of what was happening in their eyes as they continued forwards, struggling against the apparently inevitable. Then they made a last, convulsive leap, grabbing for anything to hold on to as the ground they had been standing on fell away.  
  
The rumbling slowly subsided. I unlocked my hands from the death grip they had maintained around the tree branch. Not far from where I was, Challenger and Roxton lay on the ground only feet from the new cliff edge.  
  
Challenger glanced left and right, noting the presence of both Roxton and me. "Good God, we made it. We're alive!" he laughed with surprised delight. It was so infectious that I could not help but join in. From beyond Challenger I could hear Roxton's unmistakable deep chuckle. That was how we were when Veronica found us a couple of minutes later.  
  
We relocated far enough from the cliff's edge for comfort and settled down for a much needed rest. Little was said. Bandages were changed, wounds cleaned and redressed, and what few supplies were left, were passed around.  
  
As the light began to fade I woke up from a doze to find Roxton staring at me intently. For long seconds he looked as though he was going to speak, but didn't. I watched his struggle for the right words to say something for which I knew there was no such things as 'the right words'.  
  
I took the struggle away from him. "You shot me, John," I said quietly, reasonably. "You tried to kill me."  
  
He said nothing. His eyes, blank and impenetrable, bored into mine. I was normally so good at reading his expression, it was disconcerting to see that degree of opacity. For a horrible instant I thought whatever memory he'd retrieved on the cliff edge had vanished once more.  
  
"What do you want from me?" I asked. "Exoneration? Forgiveness? Understanding? You shot me. What else is there for me to understand?" A small insistent voice at the back of my mind berated me for what I was doing to him, asking him such questions. I ignored it. I'd always been one to push, to pry, and this was one thing I wouldn't let slide. I was tired and hurt and he'd *shot* me, and I damn well wanted to know the reason why.  
  
"I didn't think it was you," he finally muttered as if ashamed to say more.  
  
"Oh?" I said, demanding more. Challenger had managed to guess that much.  
  
"I took a knock to the head," he said tersely. "I looked at you and saw someone else, alright?"  
  
The defensiveness in his voice was impossible to miss. It wasn't a subject he wanted to talk about. Under most circumstances I'd have let it go, but not now, not after seeing the hatred in his eyes when he'd looked at me and saw her. Whoever 'she' was, at some time she'd done something to him, something terrible: Roxton wasn't a man who hated easily. "Who was she?" I asked.  
  
He stared at me as if considering whether or not to answer, then murmured, "her name was Dona Maria Lopez. I first met her in Peru after the War where I found out she'd been involved in the death of an old friend of mine. She ended up being responsible for the deaths of hundreds, perhaps thousands and caused untold misery for thousands more. I thought I'd killed her. I'm not so certain now."  
  
His voice faded into silence and I looked into his face as he became lost in memory. "You'll have to tell me about it sometime," I suggested.  
  
"Perhaps," he replied non-committally.  
  
I knew a 'no' when I heard one. I could understand him wanting to keep some things secret. After all, there were a lot of things in my past that I had every intention of keeping secret.  
  
But perhaps one day he'd tell me.  
  
And perhaps one day I'd tell him.  
  
But not today.  
  
  
  
  
  
-fin- 


End file.
